


Combat Rock

by trailingoff



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Canonical Tragedy, Cigarettes, Coming Out, Distrust, First Time, First War with Voldemort, Homophobic Language, Living Together, M/M, Miscommunication
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-07-31
Updated: 2007-07-31
Packaged: 2020-10-06 10:09:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20505224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trailingoff/pseuds/trailingoff
Summary: We don’t know how to fight for what we want.





	Combat Rock

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文-普通话 國語 available: [【授权翻译】战斗摇滚](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22615843) by [DirewolfSummer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DirewolfSummer/pseuds/DirewolfSummer)

> To my knowledge, my fanfic hasn't been translated into other languages before. I'm really excited and happy about this, and grateful to the translator.
> 
> Originally posted to LiveJournal twelve years ago during my long dark tea-time of the soul.
> 
> The timeline of deaths and disappearances (as outlined by Moody in OotP) has been shuffled around a bit.

\---  
  
1.  
July, 1979  
  
_It has been suggested in some quarters  
that this is not enough_  
  
\---  
  
  
Sirius found Remus at his favourite Muggle pub, The Black Ox, on the wrong side of Liverpool. Hunched in a gloomy corner booth, Remus was drinking his usual neat whisky. Four empty glasses were lined up beside the overflowing ashtray.  
  
“Getting too much for you, mate?” Sirius asked, sliding into the opposite seat. He drew a cigarette from his leather jacket.  
  
“I broke up with Rebecca.”  
  
“You broke up with Rebecca,” Sirius repeated, staring dumbly at Remus. His cigarette dangled, unlit, from his mouth.  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“You broke up with Rebecca.”  
  
Remus scowled and sipped his whisky. “I told you, didn’t I?”  
  
“It just hasn’t sunk in yet. You broke up with—”  
  
Remus slammed the flat of his hand onto the table. The bartender glanced over at them, along with two patrons still sober enough to care.  
  
“All right, Moony,” Sirius hissed, sliding his cigarette back in his pocket. “No need to throw a fit.”  
  
“Fuck off,” Remus hissed back, grabbing his coat.  
  
Sirius followed him out of the pub and down the alley beside it, lit by the neon of a nearby strip-joint. The muggy summer air stank of piss and vomit. There was no one around, just the rustling of rats and cats in the rubbish.  
  
“Moony, come on.”  
  
“I am about to Apparate,” Remus declared, trying too hard not to slur his words. “I will speak to you tomorrow.”  
  
Sirius shoved him up against the pub’s filthy wall. “No.”  
  
Remus was breathing fast and sharp. His breath stank of whisky and too many late nights. He squirmed and Sirius wanted to nip him, on the ear or neck.  
  
“Let me go, Padfoot, or I’ll never forgive you.”  
  
“Yes, you will.”  
  
Remus slumped against the wall, defeated. “Yes, I will.”  
  
“Tell me what happened,” Sirius asked, though he already knew.  
  
“I can’t tell her. You wouldn’t understand.”  
  
“No, I probably wouldn’t.”  
  
“It’s only been two months. Better to end it now, before anyone gets hurt.”  
  
Sirius shook his head. “Before _you_ get hurt, you mean.”  
  
Remus ignored him, avoiding his eyes. He spoke in a clear, steady tone. “There are new regulations—I read about them in the morning _Prophet_. I need to get a tattoo. I need to get food-stamps for rations, because no one’s allowed to hire me. That’s how it is, now. So I sent her an owl.”  
  
“You did it by _owl_?”  
  
“What’s wrong with that? I don’t know why you’re upset. You hardly know her.”  
  
“This is the fifth time, Moony. The _fifth_ bloody time.”  
  
“I always think I can do it,” Remus whispered. “But I can’t.”  
  
“You fucking coward.”  
  
“Don’t you call me that,” Remus hissed, starting to struggle again.  
  
“I’ll call you what I like,” Sirius muttered, panting with the effort of holding on. “You charm these girls. Take them home to your parents. Make them tea and play them Benny Goodman records. And then, you crush them. Don’t you see what you’re doing?”  
  
“I don’t see how it’s different to what you do. We’re both hiding. We’re afraid of what they’d do to us. We don’t know how to fight for what we want.”  
  
Sirius froze, staring at him. “What?”  
  
“The clubs. The men. I followed you. I _know_.”  
  
“Fuck you,” Sirius whispered, the blood draining from his face. “You don’t know shit about it.”  
  
Remus wrenched himself free. Sirius took a step back, still panting.  
  
“We’re both cowards,” said Remus. “At least I can admit it.”  
  
His Apparition cracked like he’d thrown a glass against the wall.  
  
Sirius sunk to his knees in the muck. Exhausted, furious, and so hard it made him whimper.  
  
  
\---  
  
2.  
August, 1980  
  
_This was the only kindness  
and it was accidental, too_  
  
\---  
  
  
It happened after a fight in Brixton. No one was killed, for once, so a group of Order members held a celebration at Sirius’s flat.  
  
This was Sirius’s fourth flat: the barest and smallest. Since Hogwarts, Sirius had been losing his pretensions, one by one. First to go were his spiked dyed hair and black eyeliner, followed by his safety-pins and earring. He’d given his record and book collections to James and Lily, along with most of his furniture. Finally, he’d taken down his posters, rolled them up, and donated them to an infamous head shop in Norwich.  
  
Sirius didn’t need to write a will, now. He was ready to go at any time. Remus felt the same way, only he hadn’t had possessions to begin with. At least Sirius still had a flat.  
  
The Order members sat on wooden crates in the living room, drinking and getting stoned. They spoke about everything but the war, which wasn’t much. When Aberforth summoned a sitar and started crooning, Remus retreated to Sirius’s bedroom and stretched out on the bare mattress. He counted the cracks on the ceiling and wondered how many men Sirius had fucked in this room. Knowing Sirius, it was probably an absurd number: forty men in forty nights, or something equally obscene.  
  
Remus smiled, and then Sirius walked in.  
  
“What’re you doing, Moony?” he slurred, kneeling beside the mattress. “You’re not much fun anymore.”  
  
“I was never much fun.”  
  
“I thought you were.”  
  
Sirius slumped across Remus’s chest. Remus stroked his cropped hair and scratched behind his ears.  
  
Sirius hummed with pleasure. “You haven’t been nice lately, either,” he whispered.  
  
“I was never nice, Padfoot.”  
  
“I think I’m going to be sick.”  
  
“Fuck,” Remus groaned, trying to push him away. “Not on me, please.”  
  
“Actually, I’m not,” Sirius muttered.  
  
He slumped back onto Remus, only this time he kissed Remus on the mouth.  
  
Remus slid his hands into Sirius’s hair, moaning with surprise, then desire. It was even better than he’d thought it would be. Sirius’s mouth was hot and wet, and he tasted like the hash brownies he’d been eating, rich and addictive. His tongue made Remus’s toes curl until his feet cramped.  
  
Just when Remus thought he’d die without it, Sirius pulled away.  
  
“All right then,” he said, getting unsteadily to his feet.  
  
He didn’t look at Remus, not once, as he walked out of the room.  
  
  
\---  
  
3.  
September, 1980  
  
_So if you want me off your back  
Come on and let me know_  
  
\---  
  
  
Remus woke when Sirius shouted, “Constant vigilance, my arse. What are you going to tell Molly?”  
  
“Shut it, Black, or I’ll shut it for you,” Moody growled.  
  
The words were muffled, like they were coming from a few rooms away. Remus’s eyes hurt too much to open. He was lying on his back, on what felt like a cot from the Hogwarts infirmary. It was probably the one they’d moved to Order Headquarters; he could smell nicotine and coffee beneath the bittersweet salves.  
  
Something, he knew, had gone wrong with his transformation, but he couldn’t remember the night before.  
  
“Look, Black, there’s no way Moody could’ve known,” said Caradoc. “And we’ve got everyone on this. Why don’t you go in and see Remus?”  
  
“Five Death Eaters, _five_, and you didn’t have an inkling?”  
  
“_Silencio_,” Moody snapped. “I’ve had enough, Black. Go look in on Lupin.”  
  
A door slammed, and then the door to Remus’s room creaked open and closed with slow, deliberate care. Quiet footsteps padded towards his cot.  
  
“Sirius?” Remus whispered, his eyes still closed.  
  
A large, warm hand enclosed his.  
  
“The Prewetts are dead, aren’t they?”  
  
His hand was squeezed, firmly and gently, in answer.  
  
“What happened to them? Oh, that’s right. You can’t speak.”  
  
Sirius pressed a wand into his hand. Remus muttered, “_Finite incantatum_.”  
  
“It was five against two,” said Sirius, hoarse-voiced from Moody’s spell. “The Prewetts put up an incredible fight. Gideon managed to send a Patronus.”  
  
Sirius was taking short, harsh breaths. He was probably crying, Remus thought. At least Sirius could still cry. That, at least, hadn’t been stripped away. He wished he could say the same.  
  
“No one has any idea how the bastards found out about it,” Sirius continued. “No one’s saying it, but there’s a spy, Moony. There _has_ to be a spy.”  
  
Remus tried not to think of the Prewetts being dead. It was impossible, obscene, to imagine their cold bodies laid out, after a lifetime of restless mischief. They’d been the Order’s comic relief. He decided to think about it later. Maybe after the war ended, when he wasn’t living day-to-day: if he was still alive by then, and if the war ever ended.  
  
“Why can’t I open my eyes?” he asked.  
  
“You nearly clawed them out. I didn’t make the transformation.”  
  
Remus wasn’t sure if he should be angry, but he felt it. “Why weren’t you there?”  
  
Sirius swallowed. “I was about to leave the meeting when Gideon’s Patronus arrived. I had to go with Order. Couldn’t think of an excuse.”  
  
There was something behind the tone of his words; something like an apology. Remus took it for what it was. Besides, Sirius was in the right this time. Remus could have killed himself, but Sirius was still in the right.  
  
“It’s fine, Padfoot,” Remus told him, matter-of-factly. “I survived the transformation all through my childhood.”  
  
“You really tore yourself apart this time. When I got there, I thought … well.”  
  
“Pomfrey must be confused.”  
  
“She said it was like you’d been storing up rage all these years. She’s started up again about restraining you. Remember how she wanted to do that, when we were at school? I’m not sure how to reassure her. She thinks the wolf wants to destroy you.”  
  
“The wolf _is_ me, Padfoot.”  
  
“No,” said Sirius, firmly. “It’s the worst part of you, that’s all.”  
  
“Are you afraid of it?”  
  
“Yes,” Sirius admitted. “Are you afraid of the worst part of me?”  
  
Remus thought for a moment. “I suppose so. Yes.”  
  
“Then we’re on even footing.”  
  
Remus wanted to see Sirius. The tall, graceful shape of Sirius in the darkened room, bending over his cot. He tried to open his eyes, but couldn’t.  
  
“Shh,” Sirius whispered, smoothing a finger across Remus’s eyelids. “Don’t.”  
  
“I don’t know what you want,” Remus blurted. “You kissed me, and then you left.”  
  
Sirius tensed, but he kept holding Remus’s hand. “We were drunk. I slipped. That’s all.”  
  
“Don’t use that line on me,” Remus murmured, with the curve of a smile. “It’s the oldest in the book.”  
  
“All right, I slipped and then I kissed you. Let’s not talk about it.”  
  
“No, I want to talk about it.”  
  
“It’s better if we don’t.”  
  
Remus didn’t expect anything, which was why he decided to fight.  
  
“I want you.”  
  
“No, you don’t.”  
  
“I do.”  
  
“I know your secret, and you know mine. That doesn’t mean you want me.”  
  
“Yes, it does,” Remus insisted, stroking his thumb across Sirius’s wrist. “I want you, and you want me. Does it matter why? We’ll both be dead inside a month.”  
  
  
\---  
  
4.  
November, 1980  
  
_The crowd caught a whiff  
Of that crazy Casbah jive_  
  
\---  
  
  
Remus was on his knees in Sirius’s living room when it happened. Two cracks of Apparation, followed by two gasps of shock. One male, one female.  
  
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Sirius snapped. “Get over yourselves.”  
  
Remus pressed his face against Sirius’s bare thigh, flushed with shame and wanting it to be over.  
  
“Oh, shit,” Frank muttered.  
  
“Oh, double shit,” Alice added.  
  
“Erm … it was an emergency,” said Frank, in a wobbly voice. “We needed to … erm … Apparate somewhere, so I thought …”  
  
“Well, Apparate the fuck out of here,” Sirius growled. “As you can see, Moony and I are in the middle of something.”  
  
“Sorry,” Alice whispered, before she and Frank followed Sirius’s advice.  
  
Remus, still blushing, stood up and walked over to the window, leaning his sweaty forehead against the cold glass. He listened as Sirius pulled up his jeans, buttoned them, and sat on one of the wooden crates.  
  
“Well, it’s over now,” said Sirius, finally. “They know.”  
  
Remus pounded his fist against the window frame. He didn’t turn to look at Sirius. “We should have been more careful. Why the fuck weren’t we more careful?”  
  
“What, are you blaming _me_?”  
  
“No, I’m just saying … I don’t know what to do.”  
  
“Unless you want to _Obliviate _them, we’ll have to deal with it.”  
  
“Right. Yeah.”  
  
“Look, do you want to keep doing this, or not?”  
  
Remus turned around, then. “Do you?”  
  
Sirius was looking down, buckling his belt. “Why not?”  
  
“Why not?” Remus echoed, as though he didn’t ache for Sirius every second of every bloody day.  
  
  
\---  
  
5.  
January, 1981  
  
_All the animals come out at night: queens, fairies, dopers, junkies, sick venal  
Some day a real rain will come and wash all the scum off the streets_  
  
\---  
  
  
After spending two days and nights locked up with Karkaroff, Moody stumped into the Order’s meeting room, mopping his brow with a large grey handkerchief.  
  
“Never thought I’d say this, lads and lasses,” he told the assembled Order, “but I think we’ll need to hand him to the Ministry.”  
  
Moody, for once, was wrong. That night, Karkaroff cracked during his ninth interrogation session with Remus and Sirius.  
  
“Queers,” he sneered, and spat on the ground.  
  
Sirius froze, looking absolutely murderous, but Remus just raised his eyebrows. “Excuse me?”  
  
“He’s vermin,” Karkaroff hissed at Sirius. “He’s nothing like you. You’ve taken filth into your bed, you blood-traitor bastard.”  
  
Remus grabbed Sirius around the waist, just in time.  
  
“Fuck—” Sirius shouted, struggling to pull free. “I’ll kill him—I’ll fucking _break_ him, Moony—”  
  
“Let it go, Pads.”  
  
“No—bloody hell, let _me_ go!”  
  
Remus, still grappling with Sirius, met Karkaroff’s eyes. “Yes, we’re queer,” he said, speaking softly, calmly, over Sirius’s shoulder. “We come in here, interrogate you, and then we go out there and fuck. Does that bother you, Igor?”  
  
Karkaroff spluttered. “I—I—”  
  
Sirius relaxed in Remus’s arms, shaking with laughter. “You’re bloody brilliant, Moony,” he gasped.  
  
In one gesture, he pulled Remus around and into a rough kiss. Remus gripped Sirius’s shoulders, moaning low in his throat.  
  
By the time Sirius pulled away, Karkaroff was sweating and cowering against the wall, his dark eyes round with terror and arousal.  
  
“Filth,” he whispered. “_Filth_.”  
  
“I love torturing you, Igor,” Sirius muttered, tilting Remus’s chin to kiss him, slow and deep. “And I fucking love you,” Sirius murmured into Remus’s mouth.  
  
Remus knew Sirius was speaking in the heat of the moment, but hearing those words still made his knees shake and his heart pound until he thought he’d collapse.  
  
“I need you,” he whispered, against Sirius’s jaw, tugging Sirius towards the door.  
  
“Sorry, Igor old chap,” Sirius called, with a wink. “We’ll be back, though.”  
  
  
\---  
  
6.  
February, 1981  
  
_No man’s land and there ain’t no asylum here  
King Solomon he never lived round here_  
  
\---  
  
  
Apparating to Amsterdam was easier than Sirius had anticipated, but maybe the overnight stopover in Paris did the trick.  
  
Sirius booked the fanciest Muggle hotel room he could find, with a view of the Eiffel Tower. He spent all night feeding Remus champagne and chocolate-coated strawberries, in between fucking him on the bed, against the wall, and twice in the bathtub. By the next morning, neither of them could remember their names or what they were doing in Paris, and it wasn’t until late-afternoon that they pulled themselves together and set off.  
  
Karkaroff had written detailed instructions, but they didn’t end up needing them. Bad Boys Triple-X Good Times was the largest gay club in Amsterdam’s red-light district, with an orange neon sign that blared and flashed like fireworks.  
  
A few hours later, Antonin Dolohov was curled up in the vacant lot behind the club, sobbing into a patch of dirty snow. He was dressed, head-to-toe, in tight black leather and metal studs.  
  
“Your friend Karkaroff was very helpful,” Sirius muttered, giving Dolohov another kick in the stomach. “He told us all about you. You should never have offered to suck his cock, you ugly piece of shit.”  
  
“You’re one to talk, fairy,” Dolohov sneered, then cried out when Sirius kicked him again. “I thought you were the good guys, eh?” he wheezed.  
  
“No such thing, mate. We’re just like anyone else with a score to settle. Remember Gideon and Fabian Prewett?”  
  
Dolohov grinned, viciously, revealing bloodstained teeth. “Your friends died like animals. Blood-traitor scum, just like you.”  
  
Sirius turned to raise an eyebrow at Remus, who shrugged and took another puff of his cigarette. With a tight smile, Sirius turned back and kicked Dolohov right below his broad leather belt.  
  
Dolohov keened and writhed, coughing a spray of blood across the snow. Then, whimpering, he curled into himself like a millipede.  
  
“Bastard,” Sirius hissed, as waves of dark, shameful pleasure burned up his spine.  
  
“That’s enough, Padfoot,” said Remus, walking over to a lay a hand on his elbow. “We don’t want to kill him.”  
  
“Don’t you want a turn, Moony?”  
  
Remus smiled down at Dolohov; his most mild, benevolent smile. Sirius shivered.  
  
“No. I’ll leave him to the Dementors. I’m sure they’ll enjoy him.”  
  
“I’ll _kill _you, half-breed,” Dolohov spat, before he blacked out.  
  
Sirius kicked him one more time, for good measure.  
  
  
\---  
  
7.  
March, 1981  
  
_I spray clandestine night subway  
I cover red purple on top of grey_  
  
\---  
  
  
Sirius often lay awake at night, tracing patterns on Remus’s bare back and thinking about what he’d do if it wasn’t wartime, and if Remus was in love with him. If it wasn’t wartime, though, he probably wouldn’t be sleeping with Remus at all. At least there was something to be thankful for in this poor excuse for adulthood.  
  
He lay awake, toying with the idea of writing to James and telling him everything. The rest of the Order knew, but no one had been stupid or cruel enough to tell James and Lily. Sirius wondered if they’d ever need to know; once the war ended, everything would go back to normal. Still, it was something to think about, aside from the war.  
  
_Dear Prongs, I’m queer_, the letter would say, _and I’ve been in love with Moony since I was eighteen. I’ve been sleeping with him since last year. Moony doesn’t love me, but he cares about me. Well, I think he does. It’s hard to tell with Moony. He’s only with me because I know about his furry little problem._  
  
That would probably do it. Not that Sirius would ever send the letter, mind, but he thought it was healthy not to bottle thoughts up. Remus tended to do that, and then everything would burst out of him at the worst possible times. Remus only lost his block once or twice a year, but when he did, it was bloody scary.  
  
If Sirius really wrote the letter, he’d probably end up telling James everything.  
  
_I’ve got to be honest with you, mate. A few weeks ago, I found out Moony wasn’t living anywhere; he was just sleeping in tube stations and parks when he wasn’t with me, so I made him move in. I told him I needed a house-elf. We’re like a couple now. Everyone knows about us. It’s so fucked up, though, considering. It’s probably not healthy; you’re probably shaking your head right now, all disapproving like the mother hen you really are. I can’t stop, though. You’ve got to understand. I love him and I can’t stop._  
  
During the day, Sirius did everything he could to make life good for Remus. He made elaborate breakfasts that Remus barely touched. He bought a television and learned how to power it with magic, because he knew Remus liked football. For dinner he brought home Remus’s favourite curries from the local Indian take-away, even though he hated curry and would rather have eaten sawdust.  
  
Remus didn’t love him or do anything for him in return, but that was all right. It was enough that Remus fell asleep beside him each night.  
  
On clear nights, Sirius watched the moon cast shadows on Remus’s sleep-smoothed face, and thought about writing a letter to James.  
  
_Dear Prongs, I hope you and the ball-and-chain and your offspring are well. I miss you. I miss the way things were when we were sixteen. It seemed like we were very wise and witty, and the world was ours for the taking. _  
  
  
\---  
  
8.  
April, 1981  
  
_The pink hearse is leaving at funeral speed  
Driving your heart away with the flowers_  
  
\---  
  
  
One night, Remus couldn’t keep his mouth shut. He’d been thinking the words for months, letting them blare in his head like an air-raid siren. It shouldn’t have surprised him when he slipped up.  
  
He was exhausted. He’d been doing surveillance with Peter and hadn’t slept in forty-eight hours. As soon as he got home, Sirius dragged him to bed and spent an hour doing the most delicious things to him.  
  
“Love you, love you, love you, love you so fucking much,” he groaned into the bare mattress, before he came.  
  
When his heart slowed and he could breathe again, he realised what he’d done. He and Sirius were sprawled next to each other, facing the ceiling. They were only touching where Remus’s wrist had fallen against Sirius’s shoulder. Usually, Sirius gathered him close and stroked his hair.  
  
Remus’s breath caught. He was afraid to speak; he was afraid of _not_ speaking.  
  
“Don’t say that, Moony,” Sirius muttered, finally. “Don’t ever say that.”  
  
Remus turned onto his side, facing the wall. His stomach ached. If he’d been able to cry, he would have.  
  
  
\---  
  
9.  
June, 1981  
  
_You know he heard the drums of war  
Each man knows what he’s looking for_  
  
\---  
  
  
Remus was meant to come home after two weeks, but he didn’t. Sirius sat up all night. In the morning he could barely pen a letter to Dumbledore, he was shaking so badly.  
  
  
_If anything’s happened to him, I’ll kill you.  
  
Yours sincerely and with kind regards,  
Ziggy Stardust_  
  
  
Dumbledore replied with:  
  
  
_I’d like to see you try.  
  
P.S. All is well. _  
  
  
For once, Sirius knew better than to ask how much longer it would take. He was either growing up or having a nervous breakdown; whichever it was, he didn’t much care. From that point on, he couldn’t get to sleep without drinking. It made him sloppy, but everyone was too distracted by Benjy Fenwick’s death to notice.  
  
Three weeks went by. Then, hung-over and half-starved, Sirius was knocked out defending a Muggle cinema. He woke up in the Order infirmary with vague memories of the fight. A Muggle toddler, screaming beside the blood-soaked body of her mother, was the clearest image in his mind. He wished he had a Pensieve, sometimes.  
  
Remus was sitting next to Sirius’s cot, drinking a cup of tea. He’d never looked so grey and hollow before, like an eighty-year-old in a twenty-one-year-old’s body. It hurt Sirius to look at him. There wasn’t an ounce of fat on him, and his eyes were like boot-shattered ice. Dumbledore’s mission, whatever it had involved, might as well have killed him.  
  
“Sirius?”  
  
Remus set his tea beside a glittering, swirling _GET WELL SOON! _card.  
  
“What’d those bastards do to you, Moony?”  
  
“I’m quite all right. You’re the one who’s been unconscious for two days.”  
  
Sirius tried to sit up, but Remus pressed him back by the shoulders.  
  
“You need to rest,” he murmured, staring down into Sirius’s eyes. “I’ve been worried about you.”  
  
Sirius leaned up, wanting to kiss him, but Remus held back.  
  
“What’s wrong?” Sirius asked.  
  
The look on Remus’s face made his throat go dry and his hands clench. This was it, then.  
  
“I’m going off again, tomorrow,” Remus told him. “I can’t say where, of course.”  
  
“Of course,” Sirius echoed. “When will you be back?”  
  
Remus shrugged. “I don’t know. I suppose that’s war, isn’t it?”  
  
  
\---  
  
10.  
August, 1981  
  
_On the great ship of progress  
The crew can’t find the brake_  
  
\---  
  
  
“The Order is chaos,” Sirius told James, over dinner one night.  
  
“Haha, very funny,” James muttered, around a mouthful of beans.  
  
“There’s a spy, Prongs; has been for at least a year now. No one will admit it, though. I tried to bring it up with Dumbledore, but he just smiled and offered me a sherbet lemon, the intolerable git.”  
  
“Who do you think it is?” Lily asked, distractedly. She was holding a squirming Harry in her lap, trying to make him eat something sludgy and yellow. “Here comes the aeroplane, Harry,” she sing-songed.  
  
“I reckon it could be Dorcas Meadowes,” said James, taking a sip of Butterbeer. “She’s always been a bit secretive. And you said you think she’s been up to something, didn’t you, Padfoot?”  
  
Sirius swallowed and looked down at the tablecloth. “Actually,” he whispered. “She … erm … she died. She was murdered by You Know Who, a few weeks ago. First one of us to meet the man himself. Well, the _creature_ himself, really. I would’ve written and told you, but you know … Harry’s birthday and everything. Then the McKinnons died, of course. Wormy told you about that, didn’t he?”  
  
“It’s all right,” said Lily briskly, though she was clearly suppressing tears. “Oh well, that’s Dorcas eliminated. How many suspects are left?”  
  
Sirius shifted in his chair and shared an uncomfortable look with James.  
  
  
\---  
  
11.  
September, 1981  
  
_No one knows what they’re fighting for  
We are tired of the tune: You must not relent_  
  
\---  
  
  
They met in the last stall of the men’s at Baker St. Station. Sirius was nothing but a blade by then, Dumbledore’s scythe, and Remus was barely anything at all.  
  
Together, though, they crackled and burned with power. With their hands sliding, sweat-slippery, under each other’s tee-shirts, they fucked against the tiles, effortlessly. Remus bit down on his knuckles to keep from shouting, as Sirius growled into his hair.  
  
Afterwards, Remus’s hand was bleeding. Sirius held it in gentle fingers and healed it, whispering the spell against Remus’s neck.  
  
They knew each other too well; they didn’t know each other at all. When they silently forgave each other and decided they’d rather die than kill each other, they were filled with self-righteous pity and love. Really, they were only boys.  
  
  
\---  
  
12.  
November, 1981  
  
_Make a grown man cry like a girl  
To see the guns dying at sunset_  
  
\---  
  
  
The tap dripped staccato, _pat-pat-pat_, into the bathroom sink. Remus, on his knees on the grubby green tiles, retched into the porcelain. The room stank of half-digested food and bitter sweat. Remus’s stomach was long empty but it wouldn’t stop heaving.  
  
In two days, he reminded himself, he’d be attending the funeral in Godric’s Hollow. He’d have to rent or borrow some dress robes, or alter his old ones from school. He’d have to shave, shower and part his hair. He’d have to brush his teeth, eat something solid and keep it down.  
  
Just the idea of getting to his feet had him retching again, his throat acid-stung and raw. His hands grasped, white-knuckled, the sides of the bowl; his body shook and his teeth clacked together. Water gathered in the corners of his eyes.  
  
He knew there were spells to put an end to this, but his wand was in the living room, untouched for a whole day and night. He was afraid of the crackling power in his hands, behind his eyes. He wanted to be a child again, five years old on his first day of school, with a lunch satchel and a grey Muggle uniform. He wanted to spit the magic out of his body and forget it was ever there.  
  
He retched again, coughed, and slumped onto the floor, closing his eyes against the white autumn sunlight. He dozed, exhausted from shock and nausea, still trembling.  
  
When he opened his eyes again, he was facing two towels on the rack: the ratty red-and-gold school towels they’d never bothered to replace. One was neat, folded over evenly, and the other was crumpled and askew. He wanted to get up and straighten it.  
  
Instead he lay flat on his stomach, sprawled out, enjoying the comfort of blocked gravity. There came a point in life, he realised, when you couldn’t fall any further.  
  


**Author's Note:**

> This reposting is dedicated to my younger self. You did a hard thing, kid, and I'm proud of you.
> 
> In this fandom, twelve years seems appropriate. But rather than wasting away in Azkaban, I've basically become a poster girl for the It Gets Better movement.
> 
> Thanks to my beta reader, and to everyone who has commented on and recommended this story. Your support has meant a lot to me.
> 
> Quotes (in order) from each song on the album _Combat Rock_, by The Clash:
> 
> 1\. Know Your Rights  
2\. Car Jamming  
3\. Should I Stay or Should I Go  
4\. Rock the Casbah  
5\. Red Angel Dragnet  
6\. Straight to Hell  
7\. Overpowered by Funk  
8\. Atom Tan  
9\. Sean Flynn  
10\. Ghetto Defendant  
11\. Inoculated City  
12\. Death Is a Star


End file.
